The US film-maker is taking over from Rupert Wyatt, who oversaw the first film. Wyatt, who established himself as one of Hollywood's most sought-after new film-makers with the $481m (£298m) box-office reboot of the long-running Planet of the Apes series, quit when it emerged that studio 20th Century Fox wanted to accelerate production on the follow-up to get it ready for a May 2014 release date. Wyatt is said to have felt that was over-ambitious.

Reeves would appear to have no such qualms since the date has been retained under the new director. According to Deadline, he beat Guillermo del Toro, The Disappearance of Alice Creed's J Blakeson, 28 Weeks Later's Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, Take Shelter's Jeff Nichols and Juan Antonio Bayona of The Orphanage to grab the job. Reeves's most recent film was Let Me In, a remake of the highly-acclaimed Swedish vampire drama, Let the Right One In.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes, written by Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver and starring James Franco, John Lithgow, Freida Pinto and motion-captured Andy Serkis as Caesar the ape, left matters perfectly poised for the sequel, titled Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, on which Jaffa and Silver also have writing duties. The new film will see Caesar begin to assemble the building blocks of ape civilisation after the climactic events of the first film.